"You have given me a thrashing," said Fix. "Good, I expected it.
Now, listen to me. Up to this time I have been Mr. Fogg's
adversary. I am now in his game."

"Aha!" cried Passepartout. "You are convinced he is an honest
man?"

"No," replied Fix coldly, "I think him a rascal. Sh! don't budge,
and let me speak. As long as Mr. Fogg was on English ground, it
was for my interest to detain him there until my warrant of
arrest arrived. I did everything I could to keep him back. I sent
the Bombay priests after him. I got you intoxicated at Hong Kong.
I separated you from him, and I made him miss the Yokohama
steamer."

Passepartout listened, with closed fists.

"Now," resumed Fix, "Mr. Fogg seems to be going back to England.
Well, I will follow him there. But hereafter I will do as much to
keep obstacles out of his way as I have done up to this time to
put them in his path. I've changed my game, you see, and simply
because it was in my interest to change it. Your interest is the
same as mine, for it is only in England that you will know
whether you are in the service of a criminal or an honest man."

Passepartout listened very attentively to Fix, and was convinced
that he spoke with entire good faith.

Eleven days later, on the 3rd of December, the General Grant
entered the bay of the Golden Gate, and reached San Francisco.

Mr. Fogg had neither gained nor lost a single day.

Chapter 25

In Which a Slight GlimpseIs Had of San Francisco

It was seven in the morning when Mr. Fogg, Aouda and
Passepartout set foot upon the American continent, if this name
can be given to the floating quay upon which they disembarked.
These quays, rising and falling with the tide, thus facilitate
the loading and unloading of vessels. Alongside them were
clippers of all sizes, steamers of all nationalities, and the
steamboats, with several decks rising one above the other, which
ply on the Sacramento and its tributaries. There were also heaped
up the products of a commerce which extends to Mexico, Chili,
Peru, Brazil, Europe, Asia and all the Pacific islands.

Passepartout, in his joy on reaching at last the American
continent, thought he would show it by executing a perilous vault
in fine style; but, tumbling upon some worm-eaten planks, he fell
through them. Put out of countenance by the manner in which he
thus "set foot" upon the New World, he uttered a loud cry. This
so frightened the innumerable cormorants and pelicans that are
always perched upon these movable quays, that they flew noisily
away.

Mr. Fogg, on reaching shore, proceeded to find out at what hour
the first train left for New York, and learned that this was at
six o'clock P.M. He had, therefore, an entire day to spend in the
Californian city. Taking a carriage for three dollars, he and
Aouda entered it, while Passepartout mounted the box beside the
driver, and they set out for the International Hotel.

>From his exalted position Passepartout observed with much
curiosity the wide streets, the low, evenly ranged houses, the
Anglo-Saxon Gothic churches, the great docks, the palatial wooden
and brick warehouses, the numerous conveyances, omnibuses,
horse-cars, and upon the side-walks, not only Americans and
Europeans, but Chinese and Indians. Passepartout was surprised at
all he saw. San Francisco was no longer the legendary city of
1849 - a city of banditti, assassins and incendiaries, who had
flocked here in crowds in pursuit of plunder. Formerly a paradise
of outlaws, where they gambled with gold-dust, a revolver in one
hand and a bowie-knife in the other, it was now a great
commercial emporium.

The lofty tower of its City Hall overlooked the whole panorama of
the streets and avenues, which cut each other at right-angles,
and in the midst of which appeared pleasant, verdant squares.
Beyond appeared the Chinese quarter, seemingly imported from the
Celestial Empire in a toy-box.